Copyright
2001 - 2007 mi marketing Pty Ltd. ACN 098 375 145 trading as Japanese LifeStyle. All Trademarks belong to
their respective owners.
Sozai Restaurant Armadale Sozai is fairly standard design for a modern Japanese restaurant in Melbourne
with bare pine tables, but with unusual flooring. It consisted of exposed white
concrete squares with dark wood separating them. While an interesting design,
this unfortunately made the restaurant far more noisy than ideal.
Sozai has a fairly extensive entree menu, but a limited main course section.
This was supplemented by a few specials, but overall this section could
benefited from being more extensive. While the wine list was reasonable
extensive, it was some what expensive with one offering around $5.40 per glass
and the rest above $8 a glass. If there was a beer or sake menu we were never
offered it, which is very disappointing.
The entrees were server very quickly, but the service dropped to a bit
below average as restaurant became busy. I would suggest booking, even on a week
night, as the restaurant can quickly fill with diners. The service was polite,
although some what abrupt as they were very busy. Unfortunately none of the
waiters or waitresses seemed to be Japanese.
What we ate:
Entree
Wafu salad - fresh tofu, bean shoot & spinach salad with a light dressing.
Sake nanban - lightly fried salmon soused in a mirin-based soy sauce stock.
All the entree ingredients were fresh and of a very good quality. The salmon was
truly lightly fried, which is pleasing to see rather than something one might
expect to receive at local fish and chip shop.
Main Course
Sushi platter - chef's selection of nigiri & maki with tuna, salmon & prawn.
Cold udon noodles and cold soy based soup with prawn and vegetable tempura.
The nigiri had the correct proportions of fish to rice, which is one good sign
of quality sushi. The sushi rice was very good with the correct texture and
flavour. The cold udon noodles were most enjoyable and the tempura was in truly
light Japanese style batter.
Overall the prices were on the high side for the quality and size of the
servings. Given the location this was not unexpected.
Review date: 17/12/2007
Sozai Restaurant